The Queen of Peace

CHAPTER I

Arriving

The morning was damp and reddish as usual in the forest. Inside the ruins of her castle, Lizbeth, sitting on her throne of white rabbits with red eyes, smiled to herself because she knew that the moment had come. With an agile spectral movement, he got up and began to head towards the largest door in the room, the one with a large gothic arch. She was floating above the floor towards her chambers when on the last flight of the great staircase her faithful servant was standing waiting for her.

—I'm afraid our guests have entered the forest, Your Majesty. —The girl with ebony black hair and cat eyes said seriously.

—Are you afraid? My dear Saura, we are going to have a lot of fun.—Lizbeth answered while she caressed the girl's head and gave a crooked smile. She continued her march, floating down the long corridor lined with sconces, her servant following her.

The Cosmo Comitive advanced suspiciously through that forest. Finding yourself on a new planet for the first time was never easy. Sometimes they couldn't foresee what kind of things they would find there. One of the most important lessons that Commander Idara had taught them was to be cautious enough, to always have the STIM (space-time instant movement, a teleportation machine) available to quickly return to the ship in any kind of hostile situation. The bad thing was that this device was limited according to how far they were from the ship, since Joan had not found the type of fuel that he needed, —some type of ethanol— he said. The truth is that no one ever paid much attention when he talked about these things, because they trusted his good judgment as an engineer. They were worried for a long time about this mission that they had not chosen, but they had a duty to carry it out, since the life of an entire planet was at stake.

—Attentive to any event, crew.— Idara demanded. Captain of the Mystic Hopscotch, ship number twenty-two of the Cosmo Comitive. They were all  listening at all times within their suits speceally designed for telepathic talks. That way the enemy could never foresee their plans.

That forest looked like any common forest, only there was too much humidity in the environment. The fog soaked their visors, one by one  they took off their helmets. They were advancing along a path when suddenly Gregor's voice was heard in their heads:

—Hey, have we ever been somewhere where everything lost its color? — Everyone began to pay more attention to the change that was taking place very little by little the further they advanced. The grass turned gray, the trees were now gray, stopping contrasting with the fog to blend with it. It was as if the place had lost its colour, its life into a black and white movie, like that myth from the old movies of yesteryear. Except for the color red. Moisture dripped off the leaves of the trees like blood. Everything was disgustingly saturated with the scarlet color, as the mist had also turned a brilliant crimson.

—What should we do, Commander?— Sully asked in confidence inside her head, unable to avoid a somewhat nervous tone of voice.

—Just keep moving, troop. At first notice I want everyone to have their STM's handy. —

The path had turned into a small clearing where there was no mist, just a few ashen bushes. Suddenly they nervously noticed that something nearby was beginning to shake weakly and they all went into an offensive position, but they abandoned it with relief when a small white rabbit with huge ruby eyes came out of the bush and kept staring at them. It was chewing on something and its tiny jaws began to tinge with blood.

—Watch out, C.C — Ida warned. The commander did not like this at all. But she preferred to keep those feelings of mistrust to herself, she didn't want to put everyone down for nothing. They kept walking looking towards everywhere when Ida felt something under her thick hard rubber boot. Looking down, he saw what looked like a human arm torn from the shoulder by the roots, like someone ripping a doll atrociously apart.

—Ida, this gives me a bad feeling.—Eleanor whispered. —It's not that I judge the little rabbit for feeding freely on... what appears to be a human arm, but if something disturbs me it's the absence of colors. I think whatever's behind this can't be anything good. —

We can't go back right now. At least let's wait until we're really sure of the true nature of this place— Ida replied. In case of danger, they already know what... - Ida could not finish speaking when three more rabbits came out of the most absolute nothingness forming a single white spot and ran past her feet at full speed, making her stumble.

Damned devil rabbits! was all Ida managed to say as sudden surprise almost knocked her face down. —Group up and let's continue, I don't want to be here too long. I have clear orders to clear the possibilities of finding kosmo on this fast planet.

The group continued advancing further and further away from that sinister clearing. They walked a league until they reached the most macabre place they had seen so far, on a hill the destroyed tower of what seemed to be an old castle stood out. The trees there were still dripping red drops and the air was even thicker. There was no sound and the stillness of everything was unbearable. There was no emblem and no guard guarding the entrance to the huge oak gate, but there was a huge moat about ten feet deep around the building. The captain stepped forward, signaling to the others to wait for an order.